


Wheel of Westeros Book Four: Rise of Sansa Part Four

by Thrafrau (annmcbee)



Series: Wheel of Westeros [22]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Casterly Rock, Crossroads Inn (ASoIaF), Episode: s07e01 Dragonstone, Episode: s07e05 Eastwatch, F/M, Gendry Waters is a Baratheon, Queen Sansa Stark, Riverlands (ASoIaF), Riverrun, The Brotherhood Without Banners (ASoIaF)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-29
Updated: 2020-07-29
Packaged: 2021-03-06 02:01:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,066
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25595458
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/annmcbee/pseuds/Thrafrau
Summary: Gendry hosts Sansa at the Inn, and sends her away with a message about who he is to Arya. Sansa claims her family's territories, and the territories of her enemies, but is learning there is no one she can trust. Euron appears to her in a dream, and gives her a gift. Finally, at Riverrun, Sansa reunites with her mother, and torn between her lifelong dream and a horrific nightmare, sends a warning north.
Relationships: Arya Stark/Gendry Waters, Euron Greyjoy/Sansa Stark, Harrold Hardyng/Sansa Stark, Jeyne Poole & Sansa Stark, Long Haul Jon/Daenerys, Petyr Baelish/Sansa Stark, Sandor Clegane & Sansa Stark, Sansa Stark & Gendry Waters, Sansa Stark & Lady Stoneheart
Series: Wheel of Westeros [22]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1458574
Comments: 2
Kudos: 7





	Wheel of Westeros Book Four: Rise of Sansa Part Four

**_The Wheel of Westeros_ **

**Book Four: Rise of Sansa Part Four**

_Disclaimer:_

_This fan fiction is meant neither to be a continuation of George R. R. Martin’s_ A Song of Ice and Fire _series, nor a revision of seasons 6-8 of the HBO series,_ Game of Thrones _. It is meant to stand alone, independent of those works, and can be read alone by those who have not seen the TV series or read the books. Having said that, this work will borrow from not only_ Game of Thrones _and_ A Song of Ice and Fire, _but from multiple other works of film, television, music and literature. Please see footnotes for references, and feel free to point out any I’ve forgotten._

Chapter 1: Gendry

Willow had nearly given up trying to make the orphans stand in order, she told Gendry, but the sight of him had straightened them out all right. His bath had taken longer than he meant it to – he had even shaved his face and neck and trimmed his beard. He stifled a laugh as the children snapped to, for he was a thousand times less likely to lay a hand on them than Willow herself. It was his deep, booming voice, he knew, that encouraged them to behave. They stood left to right from tallest to littlest, with the exception of Jon Penny, who was loathe to leave the side of the much older and bigger Ben. Gendry scooped him up by the armpits and plopped him down further down the line between Pate and Kerrykay. Then he took his place at one end of the line of orphans, and Frosty stood at the other, while Willow went out to greet Sansa Stark and her party. The whores: Bluebell, Tansy, Dewdrop, Buttercup and Rue, dressed modestly and stood above in one of the balconies so they could lend their voices to the serenade soon to come.

That morning had been a whirlwind of activity in the Inn of the Crossroads. Gendry had awoken before the rising sun, when the sky was still purple with a hint of pink at the horizon. The day before, the Inn had been scrubbed and cleaned from floor to ceiling. Spoons were polished. Cobwebs were struck from every corner. Soiled shifts and shitstained breeches were washed and hung to dry. Holes were patched in the wall, in clothes, in the floors. Frosty and Jodi had fashioned new curtains from some bolts of faded crimson brocade that Dewdrop had taken in lieu of pay for her services, and the old brown linen curtains were sewn together and made into tablecloths. Gendry had remembered Arya saying something about her sister loving lemon cakes, so the girls set about baking an enormous one with every lemon they could get their hands on, not to mention every egg and a ridiculous amount of sugar.

That morning, they had baked four huge loaves of bread with buttered crusts, plucked five fat hens and roasted them all on a spit with rosemary, thyme and garlic, and slow-cooked a creamy chowder packed with chunks of river bluegill and trout along with mushrooms, onions and potatoes. The kitchen was sweltering hot, and the entire Inn smelled like herbs, meat juices and lemon. The children were bathed two by two in one giant tub, while the women bathed themselves in another. Gendry hauled all the water from the well and heated it, because it was hard enough to get the orphans to consent to a bath without the water being freezing. In the end, Willow and Frosty had hardly needed to bathe themselves, they had been so doused with soapy splashes from their charges. After that, they were all wriggled into clean clothes and their hair was brushed and braided. Ripley and Lily had picked all that could be found of the autumn flowers: purple aster, white yarrow, goldenrod, cornflower and scarlet clusters of sumac, and then stuffed them into pint tumblers that served as vases. The cake was decorated all yellow and purple with parchment-thin lemon slices and sprigs of lavender. _Sansa likes things to be pretty_ , Arya had said.

Gendry donned a new pair of boiled leather breeches and his newly washed white tunic, which wasn’t white so much as a new color Frosty called “tavern ceiling.”[1] Still, it was clean, and his black boots were polished to what might be called a shine. His jerkin was faded and a little tight after being washed, but Gendry didn’t think the Lady of Winterfell would notice such a thing. She arrived accompanied by a number of men-at-arms, as well as her husband, a handsome fellow with dimples, and her rather shy lady-in-waiting. Sansa, her lord, and her lady all wore shades of blue: Sansa’s gown a deep dark hue, her husband’s like the sky, and the little lady’s maid somewhere in between. Sansa’s outer gown had patterns sewn into it like waves, and the silky stuff underneath was a deep red. _She’s wearing Tully colors,_ Gendry heard Bluebell say. It made sense – she had just been named the Lady of the Crossing after all. The Tullys were again wardens of the Riverlands, and Sansa had granted stewardship of the Twins to her uncle, the Blackfish.

Upon her arrival, Stevo and Ripley played lute and harp, and together they sang a song that Buttercup had made up, being something of a poet and songstress as well as a skillful whore. She specialized in silly songs for the children. This one was just a counting song, but it brought a wide smile to lady Stark’s face.

_One was Jonny who lived by himself_

_Two was a rat who jumped on the shelf_

_Three was a cat who chased the rat_

_Four was a dog who came in and sat_

_Five was a turtle who bit the dog’s tail_

_Six was a raven who brought in the mail_

_Seven a chipmunk, bit poor Jonny’s noooooooose! **[2]**_

When the song was done, Sansa Stark and her husband laughed and clapped. “Delightful,” she cried. “Such talents – all of you!”

She was beautiful, just as Arya had said: long-legged, with full breasts and shiny red-auburn hair. The only thing she seemed to have in common with Arya, however, was her accent. Willow and Frosty introduced the children one by one. Sansa stopped to compliment Stevo and Ripley for their playing, and her lord husband gave Stevo’s chubby cheek a little pinch. The whores she introduced as their “hospitality staff” and Gendry as their guard, smith and tinkerer.

“My sister Arya calls you a dear friend, and wished me to send her regards,” Sansa said, reaching out to squeeze his hand. “I’d like to thank you myself, for looking after her after our… family troubles.”

“Well it was more like she looked after me, m’lady, but you’re quite welcome,” Gendry replied.

“You’re not the only man on hand here?” Harrold, Sansa’s husband, asked.

“I’m afraid so at the moment…but some members of the Brotherhood look in on us from time to time as well.”

“You must have more men,” Sansa said. “I shall see what we can do.”

Sansa was full of compliments for the food and the cake, and even the wine, which though it was the nicest they were able to find, wasn’t anything to get excited about. Afterwards, Willow gave Sansa and Harrold a tour of the Inn while Gendry helped clean up. Bluebell and the other whores entertained the men, and Frosty helped Jeyne, Sansa’s lady, to set up her room for the night. When Sansa and her husband reemerged from their tour, Gendry thought he heard the sound of tallying…that was good. The whores and Willow’s honey cakes had kept the Inn going, along with the occasional hammering of a dented shield or repairing of a dinged helm by Gendry. However, the needs of the children seemed never-ending. The Brotherhood lent them a maester or woods witch on occasion to fix runny noses, bad teeth and bellyaches, but they could use a nurse of some kind full time, and perhaps a true maester. Rue was passable with handling their two ravens, furthermore, but they needed more of those too.

Lately, they had gotten a few extra coins from doing little skits and plays for the less surly wanderers who came by the Inn. The culmination of the evening with lady Stark was the performance of a piece that her own sister had written at her last visit. It was called _The Crypts of Winterfell_ , and in it, a little girl and her big brother make friends with a lonely ghost who wanders the crypts below Winterfell. They part ways when the brother joins the Night’s Watch, and the girl travels over the Narrow Sea to explore the Free Cities. _Different roads sometimes lead to the same castle_ , [3]says the brother, but they never see each other alive again. In the end, the brother dies a hero in a battle with the Others, and the sister is killed defending shipmates from slaver pirates. They reunite in the crypts, along with the ghost they met and all the ghosts of the Stark lords. It was just a silly, whimsical thing, more of a comedy than a drama. At the end, Sansa Stark was beaming, but she wiped tears from her eyes. After both the old patchwork curtain and the sun had gone down, they opened a barrel of ale and had a last revelry before bed. Chunks of yellow cheese, olives and dried apple slices were passed around, and Gendry made a point of getting a moment with Sansa. He was dying to ask about Arya, and anyway, Frosty kept elbowing him and asking, _did you tell her who you are yet or not?_

It was Brienne the Brave Maid of Tarth and Ser Jaime Lannister the Kingslayer who told Gendry he was the bastard son of the late king Robert Baratheon. For a moment, he hadn’t believed it, but he could see they were not making a jape, and in the end it made sense. That was why the Lannister soldiers had come looking for him when they were on their way to the Wall. That was why he always had someone to look after him when his mother had died penniless with no family of her own. Still Gendry wondered why the king couldn’t have done better...why had he had no better to eat than a “bowl of brown” most days? Why hadn’t his mother had good medicine? Why did he never get a new pair of boots until his toes had broken through the old ones? There was no point in complaining, he supposed. It was likely a matter of Queen Cersei’s choice, not the king’s – but it made him angry. He tried not to think too much about it. When Lady Brienne and Ser Jaime told him, his eyes had glazed over, as he thought about his last meeting with Arya, when he could have taken her to bed. _Are you all right?_ Brienne had asked. _I’ve made a huge mistake_ ,[4] was all Gendry could say.

He approached Sansa and Jeyne, who were at a table by themselves, whispering to each other like a couple of mischievous little girls. Jeyne was pale, and tended often to cover her mouth with her hands. When she revealed it, Gendry noted there was a small scar there that perhaps she was hiding.

“M’lady, if you please,” Gendry said with an awkward bow. “Might I have a word?”

“Of course,” Sansa said. “Jeyne, won’t you prepare my evening tea for me?”

Jeyne left, and Sansa bid Gendry sit down across the table from her. She made him very nervous. Gendry became very aware of how he smelled: sweat, fish and smoke. His mouth became very dry, and his hands shook. He silently prayed to the Lord he wouldn’t stammer.

“M’lady…if you please…how is Arya. Lady Arya. How is she? Her health… and the like…” _Good Lord of Light how I must sound._

“She is very well – busy I imagine. She is in charge of Winterfell while I and the King in the North are away.”

Gendry tried to imagine Arya running a castle by herself – and he thought his burden was heavy! “The king, yes. I don’t suppose Willow’s told you we’ve bent the knee to young Griff... Aegon that is.”

“That was the prudent thing to do,” Sansa said kindly. “The wise thing.”

“But I believe in your brother’s cause…your bastard brother that is, and well, I’d like to help if I can.” _Our fathers trusted each other, why shouldn’t we? **[5]**_

“You’ve heard of Jon’s war? With the Others?” Sansa lowered her voice so that Gendry almost couldn’t hear her.

“I am with the Hollow Hill Brotherhood, m’lady. We all know of it. All the King in the North need do is say the word. But in the meantime, we’re holding the Riverlands for Griff – Aegon.”

“It looks as if we’re all needed in two places at once – even three.”

“That’s so…m’lady, I…” Questions flitted through Gendry’s mind. _Does Arya talk about me? Does she have suitors? Does her hair grow long? Is she taller yet?_ “That is, there’s something I know now that I didn’t know when I last saw lady Arya, and well…” He pulled the folded parchment tied with hempen string from his pocket. “I can’t write myself, but Frosty helped me. If you would m’lady, could your lady see that she gets this?”

Lady Sansa smiled and took it from him. “I’ll do better than that. I shall put it into her hands myself.”

Chapter 2: The Lady of the Crossing

In her dream, the gulls had circled faster and faster, first overhead, then diving downward. _Something must be dead in the water_ , Sansa said to herself, before realizing that it was she who was dead in the water. The first gull swooped in and plucked out some strands of her hair before flying away. Two more brushed her face with their vile feathers, and a third scratched her face with its talons, near the eye, as the eagle had done to Jon. _I’ll be scarred and maimed!_ More of them flew at her face, and more still seemed to form out of the clouds above, whirling around and blocking out the light of the sun. Their screeching grew louder and louder, mournful and angry all at once. They dove at Sansa’s face at uncanny speed, pecking at both her eyes. Sansa felt herself going blind… and deaf as well from their terrible screaming. _Stop it, stop it, please!_ Then finally, she woke up…or thought she did.

She rose from the bed she shared with Jeyne and Harrold on board the _Silver Eagle_ , and groped in the dark for her sleeping robe. Despite the late autumn cool, it was unbearably stuffy in the quarters, and Sansa felt she could kill for a breath of fresh air. Her elbow was sore from when Harrold had wrenched it, and she had slept on it wrong besides. Looking out the cabin window, she could see moonlight pouring down – it was a clear night. She slid her feet into her slippers and wrapped her cloak around her shoulders, deciding to go up on deck. Jeyne woke and begged to come with her, so Sansa let her get up to fetch some wine. She didn’t want her lady clinging to her like a shadow, but she wouldn’t leave the poor weak girl alone with Harrold, either.

This part of the journey was secret. Lords Jason and Patrek Mallister had escorted her and her men from the Inn at the Crossroads to Seagard, from which she would sail to Casterly Rock. The seat of her family’s worst enemy had been surrendered to her uncle Brynden, and now some of its riches might be open to Winterfell. Sansa was wary, and thought there could be some trick. What trust she had in Petyr had dwindled of late, and she half expected she’d never make it to shore alive. Outside her cabin, Albar Royce and Wallace Waynwood stood guard, and insisted on following her to the deck for her safety. Yet, who was to say that if she were to have her throat slit, one of them wouldn’t hold the knife? Sansa hated this feeling, but knew it would remain until she was back at Winterfell again.

Sansa had confronted Petyr about the scroll he gave Arya, forcing him to play “What is the Worst” until he gave her sufficient explanation. “What is the worst reason you could have for giving my sister a scroll that made me look like a traitor to our family?”

“What you should be asking, my love, is what reason your sister could have for accusing me,” Petyr replied. “The only gift I gave Arya was keeping her bloody and murderous secrets safe, I swear to you.”

“Did you know what Ramsay Snow was like when you gave Jeyne to him?”

Sansa had grown very impatient with Jeyne. It was she who was supposed to comfort Sansa in the night, and yet again and again, Sansa was tasked with dabbing Jeyne’s forehead with a cool rag after yet another nightmare. Now that she had given Alys over to Val and Mya to Arya, she had to rely on Randa and Jeyne. Luckily, Randa had courage enough for both of them, because Jeyne was a craven through and through. Now that Randa was going off to Fairmarket with Petyr, Sansa was stuck with this quivering mess for a lady’s maid, and it was Ramsay Snow’s (and Petyr’s) fault. Jeyne never talked about her short and horrifying marriage, but one day, Sansa had chanced to see her while she was getting out of her bath. She walked in, and had immediately backed away, wanting to give Jeyne her privacy. Then she had seen them: rings of bite marks in purple on her back, her breasts, her legs. Angry red claw marks crossed her entire torso like plow marks in a field. The letter “R” had been carved into the area above her pubic hair, and on her behind. Tears had stung Sansa’s eyes, and she clutched her mouth shut to keep that night’s supper from reemerging, but she composed herself before she knocked and entered. If Jeyne couldn’t be strong, Sansa would have to be strong for her instead.

“It was never meant to be permanent…how could it be?” Petyr said.

“What about Harrold…did you know about him?”

Petyr’s eyes looked pained. “I knew only what you knew, I swear to you. Why?” He moved closer to Sansa. “Has he hurt you? Has he beaten you? Tell me it isn’t so.”

“What do you think?”

Sansa had woken up their last night at the Crossroads Inn to see Harrold was gone from the room. Her sleep was fitful after seeing Gendry’s note to Arya, which she had read as soon as she had gotten a moment alone. It was written in the awkward hand of someone who could read and write, but barely. _Dear Arya, I was rong to say we cannot bee together. I am a bastard son of Robert Bartheion, latly the king. Brianna of Tart will tell you. I love you, Gendry._ The young smith _had_ looked awfully familiar to Sansa, and now she knew why. She debated whether to tell Petyr, and in the end refolded and retied the note, and kept the knowledge to herself. Harrold had stumbled into the room, making an excuse about the privy, but he didn’t smell like a privy. He had smelled like the Inn’s whores. Sansa had only glowered at Harrold, but the next day, she’d sussed out the truth. When they said goodbye, the sweet little orphans had sung to her again. Then Gendry had presented her with a gift – a little contraption that he had constructed himself out of thin molded steel. It had a lever, that when cranked, put into motion a set of paddles that spun against each other. _It’s a mixer,_ he told her. _For cakes and such_. Sansa had been downright amazed. One of the whores, whose name Sansa didn’t remember, had gushed about the effort it saved with the honey cakes they sold. Then Sansa had gotten a whiff of her.

The next night in their tent, Sansa had lost her temper, a thing she was more and more apt to do lately. Harrold had the nerve to nuzzle her softly and place his hand on her breast, but when he began gently to push her toward the bed, Sansa had given him a not-so-gentle shove.

“Don’t touch me,” she had hissed.

“What’s wrong with you?” Harrold dared ask.

“I have opened my legs every night for you on this journey… _every night_! And you still couldn’t keep from a whore’s bed!”

The more Harrold equivocated, the more he denied, the more Sansa knew it to be true. _Accommodate him, please_ , Petyr had whispered to her the night before they left, when they lay on a pile of furs in a rubble-filled cell in the guards keep _. For your sake, for us, you must make yourself available to him._ He was right, of course. Moon tea wasn’t always at the ready – Morna Whitemask was off with Jon, Mya was off at Torrhen’s Square with Arya, and Val was with child. Should Sansa fall pregnant when she hadn’t let Harrold near her for months, it could destroy everything she was building. So she had given herself to her husband, forgetting her resentment about his infidelities for the time being. He was still handsome, and that first night, he had acted so glad and grateful – as if the gods had finally answered his most fervent prayers. _I’ve missed you so, my darling, my dear. I’ve wanted this more than my own life_ , he breathed in her ears over and over.

However, when she had refused him again that evening at Seagard, that tenderness all but disappeared. First, he threw a simpering Jeyne out of the room, then he cursed at Sansa for accusing him, then he begged like a starving dog, then he grabbed her by the waist and pulled her to him violently. She slapped him, and he returned the favor. He finally dragged her by the elbow to the bed, ripped her good silk nightdress, and forced her as she spat curses at him. After all that, _she_ was the one who had to pet _Jeyne_ until she stopped trembling. _Oh why don’t you obey him…you must always obey him,_ the stupid girl kept saying. The first order of business when they got to Riverrun was to find a new lady’s maid.

There was some satisfaction in watching Petyr’s face darken as he raised two fingers to the pink welt that had formed on her cheekbone. His look of soreness turned to rage.

“This, too, is temporary, my love,” Petyr said through his teeth. “This time will be hardly even a memory…you’ll see. Be strong for me, and I will give you this realm.”

Sansa shook her head. “Petyr I don’t like it when you talk like this. It sounds like treason…I swore fealty to Jon.”

“You must do what we talked about…you must try!”

“I told you, I can’t do that. Not after what he did for me. For us…or have you forgotten?”

Petyr had asked her numerous times to get Jon overthrown. It wouldn’t take much, he told her. Many of the Northern Lords despised him for allowing the Wildlings south of the Wall, even giving them lands and positions.

“He doesn’t have to die. I would never ask you to do that. I can get him a ship, and enough gold to make it to Braavos,” said Petyr.

“I cannot betray him…” _You’ll never let him live…I know you…_

“In the Free Cities, a man with Jon’s resourcefulness and skill can go far. I can think of any number of sellsword companies that would pay a hefty wage to a man with a giant wolf who survived his own murder…”

“No!” Sansa snapped and turned away from him. “When this war with the Others is over, I will ask Jon to step down. That’s all I can do for you.”

“Suppose he refuses…”

“He won’t.”

“Has it not occurred to you that this tale of wights and Others is Jon’s way of grasping at power? That he’s made up these threats to force the North to follow him? And why stop there? When he retreats the people of the North to the Neck, what’s to keep him from spreading his power to the Riverlands… _your_ lands!”

“Stop. Please.” Of course, it had occurred to her, but she must banish such thoughts, she knew. In the end, Petyr had accepted that she would never actively overthrow her brother.

The last thing he had said to her was, “Whatever happens at Riverrun, you must be as strong as you’ve ever been. Understand that I love you, and have always wanted nothing more to protect you, but there are things from which I cannot shield you. Pain I can only share with you. You must…be… _strong_!”

Chapter 3: The Crow’s Eye

Sansa Stark’s dreams were deliciously surprising. They started off in mawkish pleasantry. Flowers, songs, dancing, brave princes with shining golden hair. It was enough to make Euron’s teeth fall out from all the sugary sweetness. But then the songs turned bloody and torrid and the heroes turned into fanged monsters cloaked all in black. The flowers smelled of offal and their petals turned into dark wings like fanned knives. She trusted only the bastard now, as much as anyone can trust a bastard and a madman. In the form of a fog thicker than soup, he slid onto the deck of the Mallisters’ _Silver Eagle,_ soon to be Sansa’s _Silver Wolf,_ though she didn’t know that. It was easy enough to lure Sansa from her sleep and obscure the vision of her men, but Euron knew he must not underestimate her. Cersei liked to think she was some frightened, trainable little field mouse, but this one was more like a fox – pretty but quick, with a bite that could fester. If he wasn’t careful, she’d slip out of sight before he could place the gift in her pale hand.

Euron took a long look at Sansa’s plump, swinging breasts through the fabric of her nightgown. No question about it – she was a beauty. She stepped to the edge of the ship, grasping the handrail and staring up at the fat moon. A faint bruise like a little strawberry glowed on her otherwise blemishless face. Euron could taste her sorrow. Once he’d put the two Vale men into a waking sleep, the fog again became the man. The Crow’s Eye wore an overcoat of purple velvet (Sansa enjoyed purples), a shirt underneath as white as the moon, and leather breeches black as night. He stood beside her and savored the brief moment of time during which she didn’t know he was there, watching her. Then at last, her enchanting blue eyes widened, and slowly her head began to swivel toward him. Her scrumptious little mouth hung open for just a second, but then shut again. She swallowed, and then jsut went back to staring up at the moon.

“Trouble sleeping, princess?” Euron asked.

“Clearly not, because I’m dreaming,” said Sansa. “If not, you’re here to murder me, and you’re being exceedingly slow about it, given I have a dozen highly skilled knights on board sworn to protect me.”

“Do you know who I am?”

“Not a clue.”

“You’re lying.”

“Sansa Stark.”

“Come again?”

“This is _my_ dream, so everyone in it is _really me_ , is it not?”

“I can say with complete sincerity that I have no idea what the fuck you’re talking about, my lady.”

Sansa turned to him. “What do you want then, Lord Greyjoy?”

“A dance with the most beautiful woman in the Seven Kingdoms.”

The music drifted in from off the waves, quiet at first. Euron held his hand out to the wolf princess, and she took it, placing the other on his shoulder. Her nightclothes were replaced with a grand gown with sleeves of silver lace. The bodice was purple silk veined with tentacles in silver thread, and the skirt flowed from her hips to her ankles, the light of the moon rippling in the dark silk so that it seemed to roll like the sea itself, shushing against the boards. A silver circlet bedecked with onyx crystals and amethysts rested upon her smooth white brow. As they danced, a ghostly voice rose up with the music, eerie and chilling.

_There’s a place I like to hide_

_A doorway that I run through in the night_

_Relax child, you were there_

_But only didn’t realize and you were scared…_

“Has my lord ended your betrothal to the queen?” Sansa asked.

“The queen…I’m afraid you’ll have to be more specific.”

“You don’t consider Myrcella the true queen?”

“Let’s just say that I consider her.”[6]

“Consider this, my lord,” Sansa said, lifting her face close to his. “If you wed Myrcella, your days are numbered. You’re a great captain and a warrior, but I know Cersei Lannister. If you make an enemy of her, she’ll never stop until she’s destroyed you. Everyone who’s stood in her way… she’s found a way to murder them.”

“Why lady Sansa…you almost sound as if you admire her!”

“I learned a great deal from her.”[7]

_It’s a place where you will learn_

_To face your fears, retrace the years_

_And ride the whims of your mind…_

“Myrcella is the queen of nothing, and Cersei less than nothing,” Sansa continued. “My people’s lands have openly rebelled – even the Vale. Aegon Targaryen has Dorne, the Stormlands, and the Reach. You’ve misplaced your attachments I’m afraid.”

“Well, I would wed myself to young Griff, but that accent… _yecchhh_!”

_Commanding in another world_

_Suddenly you hear and see_

_This magic new dimension…_

“Now the Northern accent… _that’s_ quite lovely,” said Euron, pulling Sansa a little closer to him, his hand circling her waist.

“Pity…my brother has already wed.”

Euron tossed his head back and laughed deep in his throat. “Damned luck.”

_I will be watching over you_

_I am going to help you see it through_

_I will protect you in the night… **[8]**_

The music faded and the dance was over. Euron was almost sad to leave her, but the twilight was descending and the spell would soon be broken, which didn’t leave time to explain that it was _Euron Greyjoy_ _who held the Reach_ , and the Westerlands as well. Sansa continued to dance in her nightclothes again, by herself, even after Euron separated from her, as if she hadn’t needed him for the dance at all. It was not Euron’s intention for her to get away from him.

“I must go now Sansa Stark,” he said.

“Goodbye then,” said Sansa, twirling in the other direction. Euron reached out and seized her hand again.

“A gift, to remember me by.” He pulled the hand mirror from his coat and placed it in her hand in a single fluid motion. It was a token of the seas, the handle of mother-of-pearl, the glass lined with blue periwinkles.

“You can’t keep what’s given you in a dream,” Sansa said.

“Look in it…tell me what you see.”

Sansa held the mirror up until her radiant visage fell into the glass. “I see myself. Sansa Stark. Lady of the Vale and the Crossing.”

“And of the Rock.”

“What? No, I…” Her brow wrinkled when the image in the glass changed.

“And what do you see now, my princess?”

“My father…in the throne room of the Red Keep…and Littlefinger. Petyr. He…”

Euron’s mouth watered as he watched the horror creep across her lovely face. Once again, he floated along the deck as a fog, but before he left Sansa standing there with tears in her eyes, his whisper pierced the silence of the early morning. _You have misplaced your attachments as well, princess…beware. I am with you in the glass…keep it close._

Chapter 4: The Lady of the Rock

The Stranger was consumed first, burning as hot as Sansa’s anger at Arya. At Petyr. At Sandor Clegane. Bran. Gendry Waters. Uncle Brynden. Jason Mallister. All of them who knew and didn’t tell her the truth, but just let her step alone and unprepared into this nightmare. The image of the Stranger in marble at Riverrun’s sept had been painted in lurid colors, and resembled something human and yet not human. That it looked in some ways human was what made it disturbing and terrifying, Sansa realized. Had it just looked like some monster, it would not strike a chill in the heart the same way. Beneath the monstrous details: wings like dragons, fangs like wolves, claws like birds, cruel horns and red eyes, you could see a man’s features. That was the horror. _Why didn’t anyone tell me? Is there no one I can turn to? No one I can trust?_

Sansa had arrived alive at Casterly Rock, which from afar was a vision of majesty she hadn’t ever imagined – like an enormous stone lion perched on the edge of the world, glowing with the red of the setting sun. Had she stayed married to Tyrion Lannister, it might have been hers, she had thought. Harrold had been as awed as she was, for the Rock dwarfed Ironoaks and the Eyrie both. Both of them were aware they were walking into enemy territory, and the knights accompanying them were on alert, even when they had passed through the Lion’s Mouth and were escorted safely inside the castle by Sansa’s own uncle Edmure Tully.

In no time, the impression given by the view of the castle from their ship had faded completely. The Rock was all but abandoned. A few Riverland folk guarded its stores of treasure and were overseeing the mines, but the castle lacked much of anything in the way of a housekeeping staff. Dust from the quarries had been allowed to settle on the floors, the furnishings and the house statues. It was caked in the folds of drapes and obscured every window. The stone garden had gone completely overgrown, the flowering plants tall and scraggly and gone to seed, weeds choking out the trimmed shrubs and spilling from cracks in the stones. The roots of the Weirwood had gone out of control, twisting up and over the garden path and strangling the fruit trees. Animals like opossums, skunks, and groundhogs had taken over, along with a host of birds whose droppings covered everything. Birds has also made their way into multiple holes in roofs that had gone unpatched, building their nests in rafters and cupboards and corners. Rats nested in mattresses, and raccoons made passageways through all the walls. The place stank of disease and neglect.

The treasures of the Golden Gallery had been gathered up and stuffed into wayns, and huge barges were piled with stones cut into neat blocks for building. When Sansa had asked where it was all going, she was told the answer was up to her. The Rock, Edmure told her, and all its resources, belonged to her. Lord Tytos Blackwood of Raventree was acting as a sort of castellan, but it was otherwise open to occupation. Sansa couldn’t believe it. Where were all the Lannisters and their bannerman? What would become of the people of Lannisport without an acting lord? Lord Karyl Vance had then implied that the Westerlands were under a curse, and the people, both highborn and smallfolk alike, had been disappearing for some time. It was best to take what they could from the castle, he told Sansa and Harrold, and leave it until the darkness lifted. This seemed like a waste to Sansa, but she had been in too much a state of shock to argue. Instead, she ordered some of the gold be donated to the Heddle sisters at the Inn of the Crossroads, with only the stipulation that _it must not be used to hire more whores_. The rest, including the stone for building, would go to Winterfell. Lords Bracken, Blackwood, Vance, Mooton and Mallister named Sansa Lady of the Rock, and Sansa granted stewardship of the castle to Lord Blackwood, who had been the last to submit to Lannister rule. The Mallisters also gave her the _Silver Eagle_ , which she would rename the _Silver Wolf_ as soon as possible. What was strangest was that Sansa had dreamt of this while they were at sea. In the dream, Euron Greyjoy had danced with her and called her Lady of the Rock.

The Smith burned next, the paint peeling away from the marble hammer he held aloft and drifting through the acrid smoke. Sansa thought of Gendry, King Robert’s bastard son, his little orphans, and his whores. She supposed it wasn’t his responsibility to tell her what had become of her mother, any more than it was the whore’s responsibility to keep Harrold faithful. Of course, Harrold was overjoyed at Sansa’s new title, because it was also his new title. The wealth of the Rock was now his wealth. He couldn’t possibly understand what this meant to Sansa, whose family the Lannisters had destroyed. Sansa, furthermore, couldn’t possibly have known that her shining glint of joy would turn to smoke and darkness when she came to her mother’s family’s seat at Riverrun. Thoros, the red-robed Myrish priest overseeing the ceremony that celebrated Rh’llor as the giver of justice (the same way the Festival of the Father in Fairmarket was supposed to celebrate the Seven) bellowed prayers that Sansa didn’t understand – couldn’t really even hear. One by one, the sons and daughters of the Riverlands threw the sacred items that connected them to the Seven into the fires that now burned their likenesses. Many tossed in their copies of _The Seven-Pointed Star._ Thoros stood before Sansa, Jeyne and Harrold at last.

“My lord…my lady. Now is the time. Cast the trinkets of your false gods into the sacred holy fire and embrace the Lord of Light!”

He was a kindly man, despite the cruelty and malice of his leader, and of his Lord’s fires. His robes were tattered and faded pink, but his smile was that of a man who felt rich indeed. Sansa made no reply, nor looked the priest in the eye as her hand let go of the ornament her mother had made for her, which had hung over her bed as a girl: a seven-pointed star made from yarn, dried grapevine, strips of leather, and bits of fur and feather bound with beads of stone and glass. It spun as it flew, and then landed at the foot of the Father, who was now engulfed in flames so hot that the star crinkled and became ash almost immediately. Reluctantly, with a heavy sigh, Harrold balled up the rainbow-colored silk prayer cloth he had carried with him from the Eyrie to Winterfell, and from Winterfell to Riverrun, and hurled it into the fire, where it too was consumed. When Thoros had moved on, Harrold leaned in and whispered in Sansa’s ear, _that’s it…we’re damned!_ Sansa made no answer. Her star hadn’t had any spiritual meaning for her for a long time. Petyr had told her to bring it, not saying what for – not saying so many things he should have said to prepare her. For Sansa, that star had been a precious thing because of the memory of her mother. Now that memory had become rotten and corrupt. It too had collapsed in and turned to black ash and smoke.

She did not look at her mother now, or what was left of her mother. She watched the marble statue of the Mother burning – saw the beautiful blue gown that denoted her mercy burn black and the marble beneath slowly char. She didn’t remember much of what passed since she’d first been brought before Lady Stoneheart. The look on Edmure’s face and the horrified squeal of his wife. The smell that enveloped her when she allowed her mother to embrace her: river bottom and mildew. The long rips in her face – had she made them when she saw Robb die? Sansa didn’t remember going to their chambers or anything about the castle. Just Harrold’s sigh of helplessness and his hand on her back. She didn’t sleep, but sat in a chair by a window in their room and wept as if her mother and brother were newly dead. Over time, she had stopped imagining the sight of her brother’s head being chucked aside so they could sew Grey Wind’s head on his body. She had stopped imagining them opening Catelyn Stark’s throat. Now she could imagine nothing else.

To Harrold’s credit, he left her alone that night. Perhaps there were some things that could stall his ardor after all. Jeyne…Jeyne had come through for once. She had sat in Sansa’s lap, pulled her face into her chest, and held her very tight as she cried and cried, and didn’t stop crying until the next dawn.

Sansa couldn’t bring herself to care then how she looked for the ceremony. To look pretty seemed like a bad joke, almost a sacrilege. Still Jeyne did her best to bend her into a red samite gown with blue Tully fish embroidered into the collar. She had struggled with her braid, and finally had to let Sansa go with it halfway done. Soon, of course, she would have a lot of help. Out of the daughters of Lords Bracken and Vance, as well as Eleanor Mooton, Sansa was to choose no more than five to be her new ladies-in-waiting, who were to come north with Sansa when she departed. The girls immediately set out to win her favor, bringing her flowers to insert into her untidy braids, snapping at servants to fill her cup, flattering her about her clothes, her hair, her eyes. _They want to leave this place and go to Winterfell_ , Sansa realized. They would rather freeze in a ruined Northern castle than continue to live with her mother: the horror who was the Hangwoman.

The Maiden’s marble braids were slowly burning away, making her ugly and bald. Jeyne had been given a weirwood bough to burn, and she threw it in with little expression. Lothor Brune, Karyl Vance, Theomar Smallwood, the Pipers, and the Mallisters were saying the words they were directed to say by Thoros, swearing themselves to the service of Rh’llor. Lothor’s voice sounded louder than any of them. As she listened, and she watched the Warrior burning, his marble sword like a giant candle wick, Sansa thought of the Hound, or Brother Sandor as he was called now. What would he say if he could see her now, standing in the light of the red god’s night fires? He could have warned her, too.

Now her mother came forward, but Sansa did not see her. She saw the sept in Winterfell, not the one the Hound had rebuilt, but the old one. She saw her beautiful mother, smiling at her and showing her how to tilt the taper and light the votive that sat before the Maiden. She did not hear the rasping, curdled voice of Lady Stoneheart, saying, _I crown you, Sansa, Queen of the Vale, the Riverlands, and the North._ She heard the sweet voice of her mother, praising her needlework and her dancing, calling her _sweetling_. She did not feel the crown, molded into the image of golden leaping fish with sapphire eyes in waters wrought of silver, when it was placed upon her head. She felt the chill of her room in Winterfell, and Catelyn Stark’s fingers winding her hair into a crown of braids. They all knelt before her: her knights, the Red Brotherhood, her husband, and all the River Lords.

It was all she had ever wanted, but it was wrong…all wrong. Some part of her thought maybe she and Harrold could stay at Riverrun and never return to Winterfell. Perhaps she could convince her mother to let Jon have the North – it was soon to be evacuated anyway. Perhaps they could be a family again, she and her mother. Harrold would be faithful – he would have to be. To stray from their bed, and certainly to hurt her, was treason now. _She will never suffer Jon to have Winterfell,_ Sansa knew, however. She thought of her bastard brother, crushing the skull of her family’s enemy with his fist. She thought of his wife and their unborn child. She thought of Arya, who practically worshipped him. Perhaps, maybe, if Sansa told her mother how he had saved their home…but no. She must do something to save him before it was too late.

When she lay unsleeping in their bed that night, Harrold’s arms wrapped around her in dull, silent sympathy, she would think of the Hound, and she imagined that Harrold’s arms were his. As morning grew near, she rose, leaving Harrold in a sweaty slumber on the bed. She found a parchment and quill in the desk near the window, and hurriedly wrote a letter to her sister. Tomorrow, she would send it along with Nestor Royce…the only one she trusted. Still wide awake, she went through her things and re-folded them: her gowns, her shifts, her smallclothes, her stockings. She pulled out and rearranged her slippers, barrettes and hair ribbons. When she reached for what she thought was her hairbrush, she clutched something that felt much heavier. Turning it over in her palm, she realized in was a hand mirror, its handle made of mother-of-pearl, the glass lined with periwinkles.

_Dear Arya,_

_I write this to you in secret and at great peril, in hopes that it reaches you safely. Our mother and the Lords of the Riverlands have crowned me Queen, and I think you know why I had to accept. The men of these lands have fallen under the spell of the Red God, and whatever you feared about Lord Baelish is likely true. Therefore, I fear Jon is in grave danger._

_I beg of you, for the love you bear our poor, sweet brother, to tell him to leave Westeros immediately. I am sending my new ship, the Silver Wolf, to make berth at Widow’s Watch, carrying a chest of Lannister gold and a month’s worth of salt fish and other foodstuffs. Instruct him to board it along with his queen and his wolf, and sail directly to Braavos, Pentos …anywhere away from here. Tell him that if he doesn’t value his own life, may he consider Val’s life, and the life of the babe within her! You, my sister, must stay at Winterfell. Rickon will be coming here to Riverrun, and there must be a Stark in Winterfell._

_If only you had told me about our mother, I would never have come here, and this could have been avoided! I will tell you (though you chose not to tell me things of similar importance) that your friend Gendry Waters of the Crossroads Inn, is in fact the bastard son of Robert Baratheon. Brienne of Tarth will tell you if she has not done so already. He and the Hollow Hill men will lend their arms to Jon’s cause, which you must take up._

_Sincerely,_

_Sansa Stark, Queen of the Northern Kingdoms_

[1] Winterbottom, Michael. _Tristram Shandy: A Cock and Bull Story_ , BBC Films, 2005.

[2] King Carole, “One Was Johnny,” _Really Rosie_ , Ode Records, 1975.

[3] Martin, George R. R., _A Game of Thrones_ , Jon II.

[4] Hurwitz, Mitchell, _Arrested Development_ , Season 1, Episode 4: “Key Decisions,” 2003.

[5] Benioff, David and D.B. Weiss, _Game of Thrones_ , Season 7, Episode 5: “Eastwatch,” HBO, 2017.

[6] Hughes, John, _The Breakfast Club_ , Universal, 1985.

[7] Benioff and Weiss, _Game of Thrones_ , Season 7, Episode 1: “Dragonstone,” HBO, 2017.

[8] Queensrÿche, “Silent Lucidity,” _Empire_ , Capitol Records, 1990.

**Author's Note:**

> I am writing in a limited POV style like Martin's, which is a suffocating way to write. I have thought of a lot of neat scenes that don't fit into the POV limits I set for myself, or don't move the story along quickly enough to include in the series. I will write these out if someone requests it. If you like this story, and would like to see a scene that got skipped or glossed over, OR that is in the POV of someone who is not a Stark, Targaryen, Baratheon, Greyjoy, or Lannister, let me know what you'd like to see, and I will make a Wheel of Westeros B-side out of it.


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